TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA will head into Kwik Fit British Touring Car Championship battle with a new rising star in its ranks this weekend – as talented teenager Finn Leslie joins the team for Oulton Park (21-22 June).

Following a successful stint in karting from the age of eight, Leslie has been rapidly climbing the national racing ladder – and making a name for himself along the way. After clinching the coveted ‘Kartmasters Grand Prix’ title in 2022, the Wakefield-born ace graduated to cars a year later in the BRSCC Fiesta Junior Championship – turning heads by winning on his debut at Silverstone and going on to secure the Mk7 class crown.

Aged only 17, at Oulton Park this weekend, he will be the youngest driver in the high-calibre, 25-strong BTCC field.

He can take encouragement from the prior performance of TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA’s British-built Corolla GR Sport, which in recent seasons has won twice around the undulating Cheshire circuit – home soil for Speedworks Motorsport, whose workshop is located just ten miles up the road in nearby Northwich.

Gordon Shedden, Árón Taylor-Smith and James Dorlin have all similarly shone at Oulton in the past. Three times a champion in the country’s premier motor racing series, the Scot counts six victories to his credit there – including the first of his illustrious career in 2016 – as well as nine further podiums.

Taylor-Smith – the BTCC’s reigning Independents’ Trophy winner – triumphed at the track in 2014 following a consummate lights-to-flag display, with Shedden close behind in second. The 35-year-old Irishman returned to the rostrum at Oulton 12 months ago, by dint of determinedly fending off former title-holder Tom Ingram in the weekend’s finale.

Dorlin, by contrast, will be making his maiden touring car appearance at the circuit, but the 26-year-old Yorkshireman – who has impressed over the course of his 12 starts in the championship to-date – enjoys a close affinity with Oulton. After claiming a dominant double pole position there in the Michelin Clio Cup Series in 2016 – which he converted into two equally dominant victories – he added another pair of poles and a third race win to his tally at the track in the Renault UK Clio Cup two years later.

The erstwhile McLaren Young Driver Programme member was also a podium-finisher at Oulton en route to lifting the British GT Championship’s GT3 Silver/Am Cup laurels in 2022, and like his three stablemates, he will benefit from maximum turbo boost in qualifying and race one this weekend – a significant advantage around a lap where overtaking opportunities are famously scarce.

Following Saturday afternoon’s qualifying session at 15:00 – available to watch on ITV Sport’s YouTube channel – every moment of Sunday’s doorhandle-to-doorhandle action will be shown live and in high-definition on ITV4 and ITVX from 11:35. The full race day schedule will additionally be streamed live around the globe on the BTCC YouTube channel, with the exception of the UK and North America, where there are existing broadcast agreements in-place.

Christian Dick, Team Principal, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, said: “First and foremost, we are pleased to welcome Finn to the team this weekend. He initially came onto our radar when he was competing in the Fiesta Junior Championship; he was a step above the drivers he was racing against, and when he then moved up to senior-level competition in TCR and immediately finished on the podium, it was clear that he is a very promising young talent indeed and somebody to keep an eye on.

“We didn’t expect an opportunity to come around so quickly, but it has, and while we could have plumped for a more established and experienced driver, we wanted to give Finn a shot and this represents a superb chance for him to showcase his skills on a major stage. Having only had a very limited amount of running in the Corolla, he faces a tall order at Oulton, but everything we’ve seen so far suggests he is more than up to the task.

“Speaking more generally, it’s a huge weekend for us as a team. The local crowd is always right behind us, which generates a fantastic atmosphere and it’s not too far from Toyota’s Deeside engine plant either, so we get a lot of support from the guys and girls at the factory as well.

“We know we’ve still got work to do, but having got ourselves into a position now where we are racing inside the top ten, I’d like to think we can take a similar step forward to the one we took two weeks ago at Thruxton and push for even stronger results still.”

Gordon Shedden, Driver, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, said: “Oulton Park is a great track, with lots of undulations and barriers that are never far away, which makes it a very exciting and rewarding challenge from a driving point-of-view. There’s certainly plenty of variety to the lap, from slow-speed, tight-and-twisty sections to heavy-braking zones and some faster sweeping stuff for good measure. While you clearly need decent grunt for the long drag up Clay Hill towards Druids, it’s also quite a chassis-dependent circuit, and establishing a good balance in the car is vital.

“Qualifying will be super-important given the difficulty of overtaking there, and some changeable weather like we had at Thruxton might not be the worst thing in the world as that tends to mix things up a bit. Historically, Oulton has generated very close racing, so let’s see what happens this weekend...”

Árón Taylor-Smith, Driver, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, said: “I’ve always enjoyed Oulton – it’s just so cool! It’s nestled in the trees and it’s a real drivers’ circuit – up-and-down with blind corners, and I love that the barriers are so close, which truly accentuates the feeling of speed. It’s a track that I gel with and I think with the undulations and hills, the turbo boost will make a big difference, so maximising its benefit will be key to putting us in with a real chance.

“Coming off the back of a sixth-place finish at Thruxton, it genuinely feels like we’ve got a bit of wind in our sails now and that the tide has finally turned. We’re in a place where the car is exactly where I want it to be, and I’m excited to go to Oulton because it’s a chassis circuit so I can really wring the Corolla’s neck round there. Everybody has worked their absolute tails off over the past few months, and I’m desperate to give them the kind of results they all deserve!”

James Dorlin, Driver, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, said: “I love Oulton Park. Like Thruxton, it’s a proper drivers’ circuit, with the major difference being that there’s not a lot of run-off! I’ve not been there for a while, but I’ve always achieved decent results at the track in the past and being fairly tight-and-twisty and not quite so power-dependent, it should be good for us.

“Every circuit obviously has its own unique characteristics, and we go there aiming to put all of our learnings so far into practice to maintain our recent progress and hopefully come away with some more top ten finishes – if not a little bit better. Thruxton finally delivered the kind of results we’ve been waiting for following a frustrating start to the season, and now my sights are set on battling even further up the field!”

Finn Leslie, Driver, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, said: “Firstly, it’s a pleasure and an honour for me to join a team that has achieved so much success in the BTCC as Speedworks and with the support of such a major manufacturer as Toyota. When you add in the experience of my team-mates at TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK with IAA, I really couldn’t ask for a better place to be making my debut in the series. Oulton Park is also somewhere I like racing and where I have always gone well.

“Growing up watching it on TV, it’s been a lifelong dream of mine to compete in this championship – it’s all I’ve ever wanted to do since the beginning of my career – so to be able to say I’ll be on the grid this weekend is an incredible opportunity and honestly means the world to me. It’s a dream come true.”